Piano World Home Page Forums Our Most Popular Forums Piano Tuner-Technicians Forum Repairs to early Schwander grand action.

I have a 7ft Chappell grand, 1914, with a Schwander action. About half of the repetition/jack springs cords have broken and someone who called themselves a piano technician replaced them with string tied in a knot!! Is there any easier was of fixing these rather than drilling out the little holes and fixing new cord in again? Also, what's the trick with hammer levelling with those awful rocker system double screw devices? A special kind of offset ratchet screwdriver or what? Thanks!

I haven't had a rachet screwdriver but an off set one works. On those I loosen up the screw I don't need to move the hammer. Then bring the hammer up (or down) to just past where you want it. Tighten up the other until you see it come back into place. Then you know you have both screws nicely snug and you haven't left one loose or overtightened.

If the old cords don't come out with heat and/or water, I can't think of any other way.

The cords are wedged in with the tips of round toothpicks and are not glued. Push the wedge out from the cord end and replace the cord and wedge. Have some toothpicks on hand if you need replacements.

No. That is the proper repair.

There is only one tool which will save your sanity when you work on a grand with so-called rocker capstans.



For more information on this tool, look here:
http://www.pianofortesupply.com/offsetinfo.html

You're welcome!

The sensible solution to the rocker action is to retrofit modern parts. I retained the wippen, but milled a slot in the bottom to acomodate a Renner heel. I then added capstans and voila, an easy to regulate action at minimal expense.

Just replacing the current style with a capstan and heel without taking a good look at design can set up potential problems. Not just leverage but friction at the glide path of the capstan at the heel.

An interesting benefit to the rocker/sticker style of action you have now is the reduced friction over what would be the heel and capstan system.

Of course, if there are other problems with the action that can be resolved by changing the design, well, it may be worth taking a look.

Larry

I must agree with Larry. Once the hammer height/blow distance has been set with rocker capstans, they operate essenially without friction and are very direct. It makes for a good, some say even better touch than screw capstan set-ups.

Minimal expense?? How much time does it take to examine parts, calculate the new geometry, unscrew all wippens, make/set up a jig to cut the bottom of the wippen flush, and another jig to the mill a slot, glue in new heels, re-install wippens, aligne parts, remove keys, remove rocker capstans, drill for new capstans (jig set up etc), screw in capstans, regulate from scratch? Can anyone do this in a couple of hours? Including parts and labor that's a few hundred $$ isn't it?
I don't find that a minimal expense for the technician's regulating convenience; the player has no benefit from this modification.

I would say: think twice before replacing this working system.

I have seen "simple replacements" that were poorly done - geometry and allignment were out, so there are persistent problems with friction, wear, squeaks/noise, and the touch is definitely not improved, quite to the contrary.

Well naysayers, my 1909 Weber plays like a dream. I wouldn't WASTE time regulating a dopey rocker action. Bring the instrument into the present day. Heck, the rocker action was a dinosaur in its day. It is a permanent and wonderful solution. Did it take a bunch of time, and assume that I had a brain, and didn't make things worse? EVIDENTLY!! Furthermore, I would do it again. For every rocker action I would ever come across, I would replace it. The long term benefit, is that the next time it needs a regulation, it will be an easy task. No, it can't be done in a couple of hours, but it would take more than a couple of hours to regulate a rocker action. Jag already has wippen rebuilds to ponder to renew the silkthread. Might it not be a great time to get out the Renner catalog and put one's brain in gear and retrofit new parts anyway? Sheesh! This assumes of course that the Challen is otherwise a decent instrument, and one is not throwing good money after bad.

John,

On your Weber, how did you determine the proper location and profile of your new capstans and heels?

Good for you, John. Perhaps that conversion would be a good class at a PTG seminar. I would love to see a presentation of the whole process.
Until then, I'll stick with the four-sided offset screwdriver. Hours of regulating the hammer line? Nah.. maybe 50% longer than with regular capstans. (Do samples first, to avoid having to re-do the whole set of 88)

cheers

Rocker capstans do not need to be adjusted as often as capstan screws, since there is no wippen felt to compress.

The location of the capstan was determined by the location of the original rocker pivot. The dimension of the heel was determined by my desire to have the wippen at the same attitude (in relation to horizontal) that it was originally. The rascal literally "fell" into regulation and I couldn't be happier. I admit some time was spent initially and also making milling jigs etc., but I bought the instrument from a college in the northwest and judging by the rest of the instrument the whole problem REALLY was that they wouldn't invest the time to regulate it or the money to upgrade it. It sounded wonderful as it was, the pins were tight, good bearing and crown, but the regulation was totally out of wack.

Thanks John,

You might consider that you are lucky.
There are numerous grands out there with work done as you describe, decisions made as you did, that play terribly.

Again, this is not to minimize your success.

But more, based on the experience of having witnessed many failures, to point out realities and risks of certain plans described with a particular broad stroke of the "success" brush.

Also, the old design does have particular benefits. AND experienced techs do regulate that style of rocker fairly quickly.

Your point on having to rebuild the rep is valid but still, for some of us, that too is a short task.

Do you mind if I ask, are you a piano tech?

Larry

Larry, I am a teacher mainly, but I rebuild pianos at times for friends and students. I have been doing this for around 20 years. I don't fear much. I have removed soundboards and disassembled them and reassembled them. I have taken total junk and made wonderful instruments out of them. My Dad was a mechanical engineer and I am my father's son though my degrees were in piano performance rather than engineering. The mechanical thing comes very easy to me. My wife is inclined to say I was "born knowing it". I don't consider myself "lucky". I analyze the design and act on my analyses. I have never had a poor playing piano action. I have inherited many problems brought about by other techs that thought they had a clue. It seems to me that if you have an action that is playing well, in other words it is responsive and the touchweight is within spec, swapping heels and capstans for that rocker action is not that big of a deal. I am not saying that it is not possible to make a mess out of anything, goodness knows I have seen a bunch of that, but if one takes one's time and reasons this stuff out the outcome should be positive.

Jurgen, there are plenty RPT's doing conversions of rocker actions. Here in Houston, it was the norm 18 years ago anyway. I saw this done at just such a meeting. I guess for me it seemed the "normal" thing to do. It certainly makes working on the action a lot easier in the long run, whether you are easing a key or changing center rail punchings after it has been rebuilt and played for 6 months and things invariably settle. Then you are once again required to separate all of those pivots from the keys, just to remove the action stack and gain access to those punchings. Sorry guys, I can't buy any of your rationale to not go forward with this. Every time you turn around and have to do ANY action work, too much time is wasted. There are many reasons that they got away from this design.

Tell me why you need to be continually going back into the action?

And ...

It sounds like you have the answers.
May I suggest you get into the business of doing these for hire.

Sell the customer, do the work, manage the expectations, be personally and financially responsible for the results. Put your reputation on the line.

After you have done this for a few years, get back to us and let us know that your perspective remains the same.

Larry

Larry, I play hours a day. The instrument gets a workout. Key height changes. Felt compacts. You know the drill.I'm all about maintenance, that's why I learned how to do it. Like I said initially as regards this instrument, it was likely sold BECAUSE of this action. It's my piano, that's why I did it. The bottom line is that I did the work, and it works great. If others want to improve the serviceablity of their rocker equipped pianos it is possible to do so and it will save time and grief in the long run. I am responsible in all ways for the work that I have done. I still teach students whose pianos I rebuilt 15 years ago. Every time I play them I am reminded of how nice they play, and what decent work I have accomplished. I have never had a single complaint about any of my rebuilds. On the contrary, I get reminded by my students how much nicer they play than pianos that they play at local piano stores when they go in to buy music.These include the major Japanese lines and also Baldwins. I still teach a student for whom I rebuilt a Steinway B. She refers to it as her "magic piano".

I doubt my perspective will change. It (rocker action) was not a great design and it has not stood the test of time, otherwise it would have been universally adopted which apparently it was not. We will have to agree to disagree Larry.

Well well - what have I started!? Great to see all these replies. On the question of replacing the early rocker and push-up, I DID put modern whippens in an 1890 Grotrian Steinweg grand once and it was a nightmare. It threw everything so far out of kilter I wish I had never done it. The action was never the same to play and this was mainly because all the geometry was thrown out and almost impossible to correct.
On the Chappell, I eventually got all the hammer heights right. They were so far wrong it wasn't funny, and my predecessor had taken the eay way out by simply lifting the hammer shank rail! This of course put so much lost motion in to the action it's wonder it played at all! Tonight will do the let-off and drop - it plays pretty good already though and I believe I'm on the right track. All good fun, and patience pays off, doesn't it?

Please explain the drill to me.


If you go into the "Rocker Replacement Business" based solely on the information you gave us here, eventually you will deliver unsatisfactory results to a customer.

You are fortunate that your project worked well. Again, based only on the information you have given, your good results may be serendipitous.

It is possible to ADD information to the rocker replacement suggestion that will insure the possibility of a proper design. It is prudent to include that note in recommending the project to others.

jaguar8888,

Yes, of course, all in good fun.

Patience will yield good results, Yes.

If you don't mind, share your results with us and perhaps some of your challenges.

Jurgens tool will help efficiency.

Larry